


see me, feel me (love me)

by lexa_lives_in_us



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Ava has OCD, AvaLance, Beebo (mentioned), Birthday, F/F, Mistletoe, Ray and Nate kiss a lot, it’s Zari’s fault, mention and discussion of OCD, the Gay is strong, the legends are a mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-16
Updated: 2018-01-16
Packaged: 2019-03-05 11:17:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13386696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lexa_lives_in_us/pseuds/lexa_lives_in_us
Summary: Sara notices.Of course Sara notices. She’s a former assassin and a vigilante, a really good one at that, she has to be observant and aware of other people’s quirks, to get her job done.So, of course, she notices.It’s Ava who doesn’t notice how closely Sara has been paying attention to her.





	see me, feel me (love me)

**Author's Note:**

> After realizing how much anxiety I’ve gotten from living with other people because of several of my OCDs, I decided to write this.
> 
> Oh, I wrote it almost all at 3AM and didn’t spell check so hey.

Sara notices.  
Of course Sara notices. She’s a former assassin and a vigilante, a really good one at that, she has to be observant and aware of other people’s quirks, to get her job done.  
So, of course, she notices.  
It’s Ava who doesn’t notice how closely Sara has been paying attention to her.

The first time Sara notices, it’s the first time she shows up at Ava’s apartment.  
She has had Gideon hack the Time Bureau archives to find Ava’s address, and she has let herself in an hour before Ava’s return home.  
Sara takes her time to walk around the other woman’s apartment, noticing how everything seems to be in perfect order, how not a single layer of dust covers any surface of the place.  
Ava Sharpe is nothing if not methodically precise in every aspect of her life.  
Sara is admittedly impressed by how clean and put together the place looks. She wishes she could say the same about the Waverider, but she knows that the only reason why the ship is always clean is because of Gideon’s role in enforcing their chore chart. Sara is pretty sure Nate is not going to forget to separate the compost for a while, after the icy cold showers Gideon has given him.  
Just as Sara is about to open the fridge to find something to drink, a key scrapes the lock of the front door.  
Ava walks in with two cartons of pizza and a raised eyebrow, not at all surprised to be finding a Legend in her kitchen.  
“I hope you like vegan cheese.” She says, dropping the two boxes on the island.  
Sara snorts as she peaks inside one of the Panago boxes.  
“Of course you’re vegan. And ew, _pineapple_?!”  
Ava rolls her eyes as she takes her shoes off, placing them in the cupboard next to the entrance door.  
“You don’t have much room for judgement over food, considering you just broke into my apartment.”  
Sara opens the second box, thankfully with no toppings, grabbing a slice of cheese pizza and hungrily taking a bite.  
Ava takes a dish from the cupboard and places it under Sara’s nose with a disapproving look.  
“It’s gooey.” Sara exclaims, happily. “How did you know I was here?”  
“It’s soy cheese.” Ava mutters, taking a dish for herself and sitting down at the island, grabbing pizza slice. “I’m a Time Bureau Agent, Sara. I covered this place in alarms.”  
Sara chuckles and plops down on a chair next to her. They eat in an oddly comfortable silence for a couple minutes, before Sara starts getting antsy.  
She drops her head on Ava’s shoulder, and she feels her tensing at the action.  
“Wanna watch a movie?”  
Ava sighs, putting down her last slice.  
“Did you break into my apartment just to watch a movie with me?”  
“Yep!”  
Ava shakes her head and sighs again.  
“You open Netflix, I’ll do the dishes.”

They find themselves on the two far opposites of the couch, a glass of wine in their hands and Sara’s bare feet in Ava’s lap.  
(“Do you have a death wish, Lance?”  
“Shut up and let me be comfy.”)  
A blanket is spread over both their bodies, and Sara doesn’t comment as Ava places her hand on her knee halfway through the movie and starts drawing distracted patterns.  
“There is no way that they had enough metal to build that _thing_ ”  
Sara barely contains a laugh at Ava’s incredulous tone, as the Agent, her hair finally down and her blazer accurately hung in its spot in the foyer, points a finger at the tv.  
The Power Rangers on the screen are working together to move the mecha they have just created by joining their Zords, and Ava is not having any of it.  
“You can’t tell me that’s realistic, come _on_!”  
Sara would’ve never pegged her for the kind of person that talks during movies, and she’s enjoying every minute of this new discovery.  
She can’t help the chuckle that escapes her lips when Ava mutters, lips covered by her glass, “Yellow pants has such a crush on the pink one, it’s almost ridiculous.”  
Sara stretches her legs and gets up to walk toward the fridge to refill her glass of wine.   
“Want more wine?”  
Ava barely takes her eyes off the screen to answer with a grumpy “No.”  
Sara absently registers how even Ava Sharpe’s fridge seems to be organized with a studies pattern, before placing the bottle of wine wherever she can find room and closes the door, turning around.  
She notices immediately how Ava turns her head to look at the screen again, feigning indifference.  
Sara doesn’t give it too much of a thought until a moment later. Because when she sits back on the couch to enjoy the rest of the movie, Ava is suddenly quiet; she shuffles, almost in discomfort, a couple times, before clearing her voice.  
“Actually, I think I’ll get some more wine.” She murmurs, getting up and making a bee line for the fridge.  
Sara observes, from the corner of her eye, Ava refilling her glass and then repositioning the bottle onto the bottom shelf, the same shelf where Sara had taken the wine from to start with.  
When Ava sits back on the couch, she scoffs at the screen and starts complaining about the movie again.  
Sara smiles softly and falls back into the pillow.

After that night, many follow, and Sara starts noticing more and more things.  
She observes Ava helping make room for Sara’s boots in her rigorously ordinated shoe system in the foyer, the second night she breaks in.  
She notices how Ava cleans the kitchen, after they’ve cooked dinner on the fourth night - first with some paper towel, then with a very wet cloth, and with a dry one at the end of the process.  
(The fifth time, Sara finds a key laying on the kitchen counter. She pockets in and neither her nor Ava make a mention of it during the night)  
Sara finds Ava’s bed always made in the mornings before the Agent leaves the house, after she starts spending the night on the woman’s couch. She makes a note of folding her blanket and placing it under the coffee table where she knows Ava likes to keep it.  
She skims through Ava’s alphabetically ordered books as she waits for her to come back from work on their tenth night. (If the following time Ava finds the only missing book in her Ramses collection on her nightstand, neither of them say a word about it)  
Sara accidentally knocks down one of Ava’s lotions as she’s brushing her teeth on the fourteenth night they spend together. She picks it up and puts it back where it was, and watches as Ava absentmindedly flips it just slightly to the left so that the label is facing forward while she talks about their latest anachronism.  
She notes how Ava’s fruit basket is always repositioned in the exact same spot after every meal, on the furthest corner of the kitchen island.  
She notices Ava washes her dishes the second after she’s done using them.  
She notices Ava sleeps on the right side of the bed.  
She notices Ava opens every single blind in the house first thing in the morning and closes them as last task before going to bed.  
She notices.  
The more she notices, the more she observes. The more she observes, the more she learns.  
Sara Lance learns more and more of Ava Sharpe, and she falls and falls and _falls_.

The forty-second night spent at Ava’s apartment, they’re not alone.  
It’s two days before Christmas, it’s been almost a year since the terrible Beebo experience with the Vikings, and the Legends have asked Ava the permission to use her apartment, in order to prepare a surprise birthday party for their Captain. Ava can’t refuse a pouting team of six adults sending her pleading looks through the impromptu video call and she tells herself that it’s just because it’s Christmas, when she agrees.  
She surveys the Legends putting together a questionably safe amount of alcohol bottles on her kitchen counter, together with a insane quantity of junk food, and prays silently Amaya to hurry up with the delivery of the birthday girl.  
The plan is to drop her a block away with the excuse of having to run for a commission, knowing that Sara will take advantage of her free night to spend it with Ava.  
The Time Bureau Agent refuses to stop and think about the fact that every single Legend seems to be knowing how Sara spends her down time, and as well refuses to acknowledge the warm feeling that the information sparks in her chest.  
Ava spends almost half hour tapping her foot on the floor and sending incinerating looks toward Nate and Ray as they flip through her books with enthusiasm. She barely keeps her fists in her pockets as she watches Rory and Leo tossing three oranges in the air and juggling with them in boredom.  
She pretends she doesn’t see Zari using her powers to lift herself up in the air to hang mistletoe all over the house.  
When she hears her key - _Sara’s_ _key_ \- scrape the lock, she breathes a sigh of relief.  
The Legends start yelling like a group of imbeciles as Sara enters, a look of surprise colouring her features.  
Sara takes her shoes off and places them in their spot before hugging every single one of her teammates, thanking them for the birthday wishes and for the surprise party. Amaya joins them shortly after and Sara squeals as she squeezes her best friend into her arms. Ava distractedly scratches a birthmark on her palm, feeling Sara getting closer and closer to her.   
“Thank you for putting up with them for a full day.”  
Ava’s gaze shoots upward, meeting Sara’s.  
“You...”  
“Knew. Of course I knew. I love them, but they’re not exactly the stealthiest people on the planet.”  
Ava almost snorts.  
“Yeah. I know.”  
Sara chuckles, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. Ava, like many other times before, feels the strong impulse to kiss her.  
She clears her voice instead and nods to herself.  
“Happy birthday, Sara.”  
“Thanks, Aves.”  
And then, Sara stands on her tiptoes and hugs her.  
Ava freezes for a solid second before melting into the hug, inhaling Sara’s scent and memorizing as much as she can of it.  
When they break apart, the Legends loudly call them from the living room for Sara to open her birthday gifts.  
Sara laughs and makes her way to the couch, picking up the books Ray and Nate have scattered around the living room and putting them on the shelf, barely sparing a look at them as she correctly places all of them in their right spot.  
Ava blinks.  
“You comin’, hotcakes?”  
Following Mick Rory’s voice, Ava sits herself on the arm of her own couch, currently filled with that band of misfits that Sara dares calling heroes.  
The woman in question is sitting on the carpet, surrounded by birthday gifts more or less decently wrapped. She looks like a kid on Christmas Day and Ava almost chuckles to herself as she thinks how fitting the mental image is.  
She watches as Sara unwraps every single present with care and with enthusiasm: a new set of throwing knives from Amaya and Zari, a ridiculous Christmas Sweater with Beebo’s face on the front from Nate and Ray, a bottle of aged whiskey from Mick and Leo, and a device with and ologramma-message from Jefferson Jackson wishing her a happy birthday.  
Sara looks up with the biggest smile on her face to find Ava already looking at her. She raises an eyebrow.  
Ava rolls her eyes and bends to grab her own present from behind the couch, tossing it to Sara and to her shit eating grin.  
Sara unwraps it with the same enthusiasm as she did the others, and freezes with wide eyes when she opens the box.  
“Holy guacamole, are those..?” Ray starts.  
“They are.” Sara murmurs, raising her glistening eyes to meet Ava’s pleased ones. “Ava, what the _fuck_. How did you...?”  
“Time Bureau has some pretty cool technology, and Rip owed me one or two favours.” She shrugs.  
Zari raises her hand.  
“Can someone explain to the rest of us common mortals how can a pair of sticks be cooler than our throwing knives?”  
“I’m pretty sure no one here is a common mortal, considering only how many times Sara has died.”   
Mick slaps Nate on his head, as Ava rolls her eyes.  
“You get my point.” Zari insists.  
Sara, whose eyes haven’t left Ava’s face during the whole conversation, is the one who answers.  
“They’re batons with magnetic cuffs.” She explains with an unreadable expression. “I keep the cuffs on my wrists and if I happen to throw a baton during a fight, I can have them called back through a magnetic field. It’s a very precise and advanced technology.”  
There’s a long moment of silence, during which Ava lowers her eyes on her palms.  
“Holy shit, Ava.” Zari finally exhales.  
The Legends crowd around the box to touch and analyze the batons, and Sara disentangle herself from the group to collapse on the couch right next to Ava.  
“Thank you.” Sara says, lowering her voice. Ava dares looking sideways to her. Sara is sporting a gentle smile that Ava has learned to recognize and love, a smile that shows all the softness Sara has inside and that only rarely shows to the outside world. Every time she sees that smile, Ava considers herself lucky.  
“Seriously, Aves.”  
Ava shrugs, but can’t help the somehow smug smile that starts splitting her features.  
“It’s whatever.”  
Sara laughs and shakes her head, standing up.  
“Alright, nerds. Give me back my present. Isn’t time for my birthday cake, anyway?”  
If there’s something the Legends love more than cool toys and weapons, it’s food.  
The reminder of the cake they have brought from the Waverider is enough for all of them to jump to their feet and start making their way to the kitchen.  
Ava follows them and shoots a killer glance at Nate before he dares putting his hands inside her fridge. She’s the one opening it and taking the cheesecake out of it, turning just in time to see Sara absentmindedly moving the fruit basket a couple inches to her left, placing it in the corner of the island, before plopping down on her stool with a hungry smile.  
Ava realizes she’s been staring at Sara only when Zari not-so-subtly coughs from her spot near the microwave.  
Ava clears her voice and places the cake in front of Sara.  
She thinks she should know better, but she can’t help but ask “Want to do the honours, birthday disaster?”  
Sara grins and, almost as to try to annoy Ava, exclaims: “Hey, who wants to see me cutting the cake with my new throwing knives?”  
As Sara laughs at the happy response she gets from her team, Ava realizes that it’s been months since last time she’s been really, truly, honestly annoyed at Sara Lance.

Ava has to admit: spending time with the Legends never has dull moments. Once Zari is drunk enough, which surprisingly doesn’t take that long, she starts yelling for every person who has the misfortune of walking right underneath one of her hanged mistletoes sprouts. That, of course, causes Ray and Nate to face situations that would be embarrassing for anyone at the Bureau but that, for the Legends, is more fun than anything.  
Ava plops down on her stool at the kitchen island and refuses to move, fearful of Zari’s attentive and vengeful eye: the Agent is quite sure the girl from the future hasn’t quite forgiven her for the witch hunt that had eventually brought her to join the Legends. Ava watches Sara as she makes her round of kisses when she accidentally stumbles with Amaya underneath the living room mistletoe. The two best friends giggles and briefly kiss under Zari’s attentive gaze, and when Amaya trots away to go hug Leo, Sara shakes her head with a smile.  
At some point, Mick makes his way towards Ava, who freezes in place and wonders, not for the first time, how good of an idea it was to let a fire starter into her apartment.  
Surprisingly, Mick just grabs two beers from the fridge, places one in Ava’s hands and clinks it with his in a resemblance of a cheer.  
“You’re a good egg, hotcakes.” He mutters, with the same expression and tone as he is telling her he wants to murder a person.  
Ava is considering her answer when the man belches and stumbles away, closing the conversation.  
Ava doesn’t have time to think about it too much, because an inhuman sound captures her attention.  
Leo and Nate have just walked under the mistletoe and the Legends seem to be enjoying the accident way too much.  
“Nate, Buddy, what the hell?” Sara laughs from her spot on the couch.  
Nate shrugs, helpless.  
Leo raises his eyebrows, then grabs Ray from his position next to the window and swaps places with him.  
“Sorry, Dr. Haywood.” He bows, elegantly. “But I’m an engaged man.”  
Ava frowns, sure that she’s missing something about Snart, but Zari seems to be taking his statement pretty seriously, because she agrees on the new arrangement.   
The two men groan in faux annoyance, as the Legends cheer them.  
“You guys better get on with it.” Ava says before she can stop herself.  
The whole group turns to look at her and she makes a point to ignore Sara’s gaze as she adds, “My house, my rules. The mistletoe tradition needs to be respected.”  
There’s a moment of stunned silence, but the Legends start howling and clapping their hands even louder than before. Nate and Ray burst out into a laughter before obliging their destiny.  
Ava looks down at her beer, and she doesn’t see Sara Lance looking at her with a giant smile on her face.

After the third time Nate and Ray are forced to kiss by an over eager Zari, Amaya decides that it’s time for the kids to go to bed.   
She and Leo gather the rest of the Legends, help them put on their coats and shoes and prepare to head out the door.  
“Thank you again, Agent Sharpe.” Amaya says with a kind smile, as she almost effortlessly keeps a very drunk Ray Palmer in an upright position.  
“Yes.” Nate agrees, from his spot on Mick’s shoulder, slung across it like a bag of potatoes. “Thanks, Sergent Arse.”  
Mick rolls his eyes and leaves with the historian, and Zari chuckles from her corner.  
“Ava. You can call me Ava.” Ava says, turning her attention on Amaya.  
Ray grins without malice.  
“I mean. You’ve seen where Ava keeps her tampons, Amaya. I guess you guys are on a first name basis after all.”  
Ava pinches the bridge of her nose and takes a deep breath as Zari snorts and Leo openly laughs.  
“A permission that is not yet extended to you, Dr. Palmer.” She hisses.  
Ray tries his best to salute, and Amaya finally decides to drag the rest of the group out the door.  
Ava sighs and locks it behind them, leaning against the wooden frame for a long couple of seconds.  
She finally makes her way toward the kitchen, where she can hear Sara’s happy whistling.  
She doesn’t recognize the tune immediately, but then Sara starts to sing to herself.  
“ _Forgive me for staring, forgive me for breathing_.”  
Ava doesn’t say a word as she leans against the entrance of her own kitchen, watching Sara in pure awe.  
The woman has already cleaned a large part of the counter from bottles and cans, has loaded the dishes in the dishwasher and is now wiping every surface of the kitchen clean.  
After she watches her tossing the paper towel and starting to wet the cloth, Ava can’t keep her thoughts to herself anymore.  
“You’ve been watching me.” She murmurs, interrupting Sara’s singing.  
“Uh?”  
Sara looks up, the wet cloth still in her hands and a relaxed smile on her face.  
“I mean, yeah.” She teases. “I’ve watched you quite a bit. But... _uh_?”  
Ava crosses and uncrosses her arms, taking a couple steps towards the other woman and clearing her voice.  
“I don’t know how I didn’t notice it before, but you...”  
She leans against the counter and Sara tilts her head.  
“You know how I want my books to be kept. You always straighten up the living room the way I want it to be straighten up. You know how I clean the kitchen -hell, you know where I want my fruit basket to be placed.”  
At this point, only a step separates them.  
Sara slowly places the wet cloth on the side of the sink.  
“I have an OCD.” Ava says, crossing her hands in front of her. “I’m aware of it. I learned to live with it. But you noticed and didn’t say anything and just... acted around it.”  
Sara nods, lowering her gaze to the floor.  
“I did. I noticed and I noticed how much more comfortable you were when everything was in its own place.” She says, slowly, as if she’s picking each word with careful attention. Ava thinks that she probably is. “And after a while I noticed... The more comfortable you were, the more you smiled.”  
Sara finally looks up with a grin, but Ava could read the honesty and the vulnerability in her eyes.  
“And I just really like your smile, you know?”  
Ava nods, as if she does know, although right now she only knows one thing: she really likes Sara’s smile too.  
Ava squares up her shoulders and clears her voice.  
“Sara, I’m going to kiss you.” She says, matter-of-factly.  
Sara snorts.  
“Do you have to announce it?”  
Ava squints and crosses her arms.  
“I’m all for consent, I wanted to be sure you-“  
“Yes.” Sara interrupts her with a wide grin. “I’m consenting. Now shut up and kiss me, please.”  
Ava huffs and does just as much, disentangling only one arm to grab Sara’s hand and tug her closer, finally leaning down to kiss her.  
Sara doesn’t leave her hand, standing on her toes to reach higher and to wrap her free arm around Ava’s neck, and the only thing she can think is _finally._  
Ava sighs contentedly, slowly moving her other arm to encircle Sara’s waist and pull her closer, and Sara parts her lips and gently caresses Ava’s with the tip of her tongue.  
The woman meets Sara’s tongue with her own, and all of a sudden Sara is pressed against the kitchen island, her fingers tangled in Ava’s hair, and Ava’s hand are digging into Sara’s waist, both of them trying to get closer, trying to kiss the other one better, deeper. It’s Sara who breaks the kiss first, gently tugging Ava’s hair.  
Ava pulls back, eyes lazily opening to meet Sara’s.  
“Y’know...” Sara murmurs, tracing Ava’s bottom lip with her thumb, almost in a daze. “Consent is like... really _hot_.”  
She grins at Ava, but somehow is not her classic, shit eating grin. It’s a flirtatious, loving one.  
Ava chuckles and nods, her blonde curls falling over her face.  
“I agree.”  
The two stand in the middle of the kitchen, smiling at each other like teenagers at their first date, before Ava clears her voice.  
“Do you want to sleep with me, tonight?”  
At that, Sara’s eyebrows shoot upwards, and Ava feels her ears on fire, as a blush spreads across her face.  
“Not like- I didn’t mean-“ and then, seeing Sara’s smirk, “Sara!”  
Sara can’t help but bursts into a loud laugh, as she loops her fingers on the waistband of Ava’s jeans to prevent her from stepping away.  
“You should’ve seen your face, Aves.”  
Ava scoffs, crossing her arms and avoiding Sara’s gaze.  
The woman chuckles, then surges upward to place a kiss on Ava’s jaw.  
“I would love to sleep in the same bed as you.” She answers, and Ava breaks.  
She turns to look at Sara again, with a giant smile on her face.  
Her eyes dart for a moment toward the living room, then on Sara’s face.  
Sara smiles.  
“I’ll clean up the living room while you finish the kitchen.” She announces, sliding away from the other woman’s body and trotting towards the door.  
Ava stares at her for a second too long, but when she snaps out of her reverie, she surges forward and grabs Sara by her wrist, spinning her around.  
Sara tilts her head.  
“Yeah?”  
Ava opens and closes her mouth, realizing she doesn’t know what to say, how to express her gratitude and her affection toward this woman that has stumbled into her perfectly planned life.  
She looks up, looking for words, and smiles cheekily. She meekly points at the ceiling.  
Sara looks up as well, and when she sees the nth mistletoe sprout that Zari has placed, a grin splits her features.  
“I mean.” She starts, looking back down at Ava. “Your house, your rules, am I right?”  
Ava presses her lips together, trying -and failing- to prevent a smile.  
“Who are we to break a tradition?” She agrees, just as Sara laughs and grabs her from the lapel of her shirt.  
As she lets herself be kissed by Sara Lance against the door of her living room, Ava thinks that she couldn’t have gotten a better Christmas present.

They fall asleep with Sara half sprawled across Ava’s chest, their legs intertwined and their hands joined.  
When Sara wakes up, around five in the morning, Ava has stolen the great majority of the blanket. She pokes her on the side to make her release a portion, and Ava grunts.  
“Blanket hog.” Sara murmurs, re-settling with her arm around Ava’s waist.  
Ava turns around, without waking up completely, and nuzzles her nose in Sara’s neck.  
“Snore monster.” Ava sleepily backfires.  
Sara snorts, closing her eyes and slipping back into a peaceful sleep.  
When Ava wakes up an hour later for her morning run, Sara is singing Christmas Carols in the shower, substituting the word ‘Christmas’ with ‘Beebo’.  
She yells “Don’t finish the hot water!” And slips out the door.  
When she comes back, forty five minutes later, Sara is having coffee at the kitchen island.  
Ava peaks inside her bedroom.  
Her bed is made.  
Ava doesn’t say a word as she grabs Sara by the back of her neck and kisses her soundly.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, the batons are based off of Mockigbird’s baton in AOS. They’re basically the and character and I love them both to pieces. ;)


End file.
